


Walking Wounded

by cold_feets



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-07-30
Updated: 2012-03-30
Packaged: 2017-10-22 00:13:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/231471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cold_feets/pseuds/cold_feets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>
  <i>It starts with a bullet ripping through his shoulder.</i>
</p>
          </blockquote>





	1. scars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _It starts with a bullet ripping through his shoulder._

It starts with a bullet ripping through his shoulder, and to be honest, Owen would never have thought that Ianto had it in him. And while it should serve as a warning, that Ianto _can_ be pushed too far and will snap right back like a sapling tree instead of breaking, it only makes Owen want to push more, to find out what else Ianto Jones is capable of when he grits his teeth and sweats, feet firmly planted to the ground instead of hiding behind coffee cups and tourist brochures.

The wound heals over time, but the scar remains: a reminder that Ianto Jones is not the man Owen once thought he was.


	2. making up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"You deserved it. And I'd do it again." There's no malice behind it, just a simple statement of fact. An attempt to hammer out an understanding between them, even one built on the weakest foundation._

"You shot me," Owen says.

Ianto stops and looks up at him, but he doesn't apologize. Owen bites back the start of a smile as he shoves his hands in his pockets. _Good for him._

"Get your coat. Buy me a drink, and we'll call it even."

That frown that Ianto seems to reserve especially for Owen tugs at his features, but then he glances back over his shoulder at Jack's office--empty now for two days--and lets out a sigh.

"Yeah, all right," Ianto says.

It's two in the afternoon, but they both skive of, claiming a corner in the relative quiet of one of Owen's regular haunts. Ianto gets them a couple pints, which they nurse in silence until Ianto finally asks, "How's your shoulder?"

"Some bastard put a bullet through it. Twinges a bit, needless to say."

Ianto sets his glass down, looks him square in the eye, and says, "You deserved it. And I'd do it again." There's no malice behind it, just a simple statement of fact. An attempt to hammer out an understanding between them, even one built on the weakest foundation.

And Owen wants to say that he'd do it again too, but as Jack's just up and left again as way of thanks for bringing him back, he's not sure it would be worth it. Risking the whole of time and space for someone who can't even be bothered to leave a note? Owen peers down into his lager as he says, "Good."

Ianto blinks a bit, surprised by the response.

"I was a prat," Owen says because even after all that's happened, he can't bring himself to say he was wrong. It _worked_. It was the only way, and he was damned if he was gonna let the rift rip another person from his life. But he was, in fact, a prat about it.

"You were," Ianto agrees. "And still are."

"Well, don't expect that to change."

"I know better than that."

Owen lets out a chuckle and leans back against the seat, and Ianto hides a hesitant smirk in his glass as he gestures for another round.


	3. pain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Gwen and Ianto come back from weevil hunting more than a bit worse for the wear and with something lingering in their eyes that neither of them seem willing to talk about no matter how gently Tosh asks._

Gwen and Ianto come back from weevil hunting more than a bit worse for the wear and with something lingering in their eyes that neither of them seem willing to talk about no matter how gently Tosh asks.

"It's fine," Gwen says, her voice hollow, her lips dry, her eyebrow caked with blood and dirt, and everyone knows that it's not.

Ianto holds his left shoulder carefully with his other hand, dark bruises blooming under his eyes, and Gwen nods to Owen to take care of him first.

"Come on, then." Owen leads Ianto down to the exam table and helps him out of his jacket, noting which movements make him hiss in sharp breaths. "What happened?"

Ianto shakes his head. "Wasn't fast enough. Got away. Is Gwen all right?"

"Few cuts and bruises," Owen says as he starts examining Ianto's shoulder. Slight bump, some swelling, but everything in place.

"Just separated," Owen says, checking the range of mobility. "You should be all right after you have some painkillers and ice it for a bit."

Ianto nods, cradling his arm again as soon as Owen releases his hold on it.

Jack's been gone nearly a month now, and instead of things getting easier, every day is getting more and more difficult, Jack's absence more keenly felt, especially now that they've no choice but to send Ianto out into the field, eager, knowledgeable, but inexperienced, an extra pair of hands if nothing else.

"It was my fault," Ianto says.

"It's not like we've never lost a weevil before."

Owen pulls the light closer so it shines into Ianto's face, illuminating the darkening patches of skin beneath his eyes. "Just checking for a break," Owen warns as he feels gently with the pads of his thumbs, careful of the bruising. Ianto squints up at him for a moment before shutting his eyes against the brightness of the light.

"Hurts," Ianto comments, his voice slightly thick through the swelling.

"Yeah, that happens when you get popped in the face. You're lucky though. Looks like you'll be all right."

Owen turns away to check the scans for anything he might have missed, but not before catching the way Ianto's face crumples for just a second before he takes a deep breath and collects himself.

And Owen gets it: that look in their eyes, that hopelessness. Because this is it now. Just the four of them carrying on, and only carrying on because none of them seem able to muster the energy for much more without Jack.

And Ianto is right. It hurts.

"You'll be all right," Owen repeats, squeezing Ianto's good shoulder gently, and he hopes Ianto understands.


	4. comfort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _  
> "You're better at this than you let on," Gwen whispers._
> 
> _"At what?"_
> 
> _"Being a decent human being."  
> _

Late at night, Owen finds Tosh asleep on the beaten up couch in the Hub, her head pillowed on her arms. He isn't sure how many nights she spends here, but he knows it's more than she is spending at home lately. It isn't right, but no matter how they try to coerce her to go home, she always insists on staying to finish one more set of tests, run one more scan, investigate one last odd spike of rift activity.

Owen finds a blanket down in the medical bay and carefully drapes it over her, tucking it around her shoulders.

He glances up sharply at the sound of footsteps--the others had left hours ago, or so he thought. But Gwen is smiling at him as she leans against the wall, arms crossed against her chest. He's missed that look: peaceful and pleased instead of the near constant worried frown that she has worn for going on a month now.

"You're better at this than you let on," Gwen whispers.

"At what?"

"Being a decent human being."

Owen huffs out a quiet laugh. He glances down at Toshiko who is still sleeping soundly, her fingers curled around the frayed edge of the couch cushion.

He makes his way up the stairs with careful, quiet footsteps, and joins Gwen as she leans against the railing, their arms pressed together, the warmth of her skin seeping through the thin fabric of her shirt. She looks at him with those big eyes, and all the feelings he ever had for her are still there, but he knows now that he is not hers, knew the second he saw the way she looked at Rhys, the smile on her face when she came in with that ring on her finger. And now instead of pushing her so that she'll push back, push right into his arms, he lets the warmth of her against his skin be enough. Because it has to be.

Gwen notices him looking down at their arms and shakes the fringe from her eyes before casting a glance down at Toshiko. "You know she likes you."

Owen hesitates a moment before nodding. He doesn't like to think about it, let alone talk about it. And certainly not with Gwen because that just adds confuses things more. Toshiko would follow him anywhere, would bend over backwards to please him, sweet and eager and loyal, and everything that Owen is not. "And you and I both know that I'd break her heart."

Gwen only presses her lips together in a flat line and looks at Tosh for a moment before nodding. The air in the hub is still and silent, save for the gentle rustle of Myfanwy's wings as she circles above their heads. Owen breathes deep, taking in the calm because he knows all too well it won't be long before it falls apart. But Gwen only curls her fingers into his, presses her lips to the back of his hand, and leans her head against his shoulder for a moment before slipping away, leaving Owen standing in the still of the Hub, whole and alone and still breathing.


	5. kiss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Owen comes to find that he rather likes Ianto loose and laughing, discovers that it takes precisely three and a half pints to get him there, and makes it a point to get him there often if only so he can look him in the eye and see something other than misery._

Owen comes to find that he rather likes Ianto loose and laughing, discovers that it takes precisely three and a half pints to get him there, and makes it a point to get him there often if only so he can look him in the eye and see something other than misery.

Ianto tells dirty jokes and swears too much, and for once, Owen sees why Jack likes him so much. He snorts into his glass as Tosh hides her grin behind her hand, pink cheeks peeking out behind her fingers, and Gwen cackles outright.

They're all right, he thinks. It's no longer a hope for the future. They're there. Jack is gone, and they're all right, carrying on, adapting, and getting on just fine, thank you very much.

And at the end of the night, Gwen gives him a pleading look, and he promises to make sure Ianto gets home safe because they're well past those three and a half pints by now. He struggles to get Ianto into the cab, fighting flailing limbs and Ianto's slurred insistence that he really doesn't need any help.

As soon as Owen shuts the door, Ianto slumps back against the seat and passes out.

"Lovely," Owen mutters to himself.

Owen gives the driver his address because fuck if he knows Ianto's. Which is strange: working with someone for two years and not even knowing what side of town they live on. He'd been round Suzie's flat more than once within her first week ("Self-appointed welcoming committee," he'd winked at Tosh), dropped off the girls after drinks, and everyone knew Jack never left the Hub. Maybe Ianto just never left Jack. A thought that only left Owen with the mental image of Ianto, pathetic and alone in that miserable place at night, just waiting for Jack to return.

It's enough to make him throw an arm around Ianto's shoulders when he slumps into Owen's side as they pass through the door and bypass the couch in favor of the bedroom when it comes time to find a place to deposit Ianto for the night.

Ianto comes to enough to pull off his shoes and very nearly strangle himself with his tie before Owen helps him, smirking at the slight whimper of protest when he drops both tie and jacket on the floor in a heap.

"Leave it and just go to sleep," Owen tells him.

But Ianto doesn't. Instead, he grabs the collar of Owen's jacket as Owen tries to help him out of his waistcoat and pulls until Owen's knees knock against his own, until Owen can feel the heat radiating from Ianto's skin.

"Enough of that," Owen says, knowing all too well where this is going, yet when Ianto does kiss him, he lets him, just a bit, just a moment. He tells himself it's pity. He tells himself it's that curl of loneliness that tickles at his insides when night falls. He tells himself a lot of things just to get through the day. It's part of the job.

"Miss him," Ianto says quietly. "Shouldn't. But I do."

"Don't tell anyone I said this, but I do, too." Owen curls his hands around Ianto's wrists to pull him away, but Ianto leans in again, lips brushing Owen's chin.

"Enough," Owen repeats gently.

For a second, Ianto just blinks up at him, drunkenly bewildered, before shutting his eyes and groaning in misery. "Oh, fuck. Sorry. Owen, I'm so sorry."

"Aren't you a right mess when you're pissed," Owen says, lips quirking into a smile.

Ianto nods, head rolling a bit loosely on his shoulders. "I am that," he mumbles.

"You'll feel better in the morning."

"I think," Ianto says, brow furrowing as he sways in place a bit even as he sits, perched on the edge of Owen's bed, "I will probably feel worse."

Owen laughs as he turns off the light, toeing off his shoes and kicking them into the corner as Ianto slumps down into a pillow. He shucks his jacket and doesn't bother with the rest, too tired, too clumsy fingered and tipsy now that he doesn't have Ianto to worry about. He flops down on the mattress and sighs as his head hits the pillow and waits in the dark for sleep to slowly overtake him.

"Thanks," Ianto says in the quiet, and Owen startles a bit, having thought Ianto was passed out. "For not leaving me alone."

"Go to sleep," Owen says. "Doctor's orders."

Ianto shuts his eyes, and Owen shoves at his pillow and does the same, until he finds himself blinking at sunlight and baffling at just how easy it was to fall asleep with Ianto Jones safe beside him.


	6. life or death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"You," Owen says, sticking his head into the conference room where Ianto is picking up the dishes everyone has left behind, "are going to learn how to suture."_

"You," Owen says, sticking his head into the conference room where Ianto is picking up the dishes everyone has left behind, "are going to learn how to suture."

Ianto stops, straightens, and blinks at him. "And why would I learn _your_ job?" he asks with a confused frown.

"Because I can't stitch myself up most of the time, and I'm not going to NHS every time I have a run in with a weevil."

Owen has noticed the way the nurses in A&E look at them whenever one of them comes in. The hospitals know their faces by now, and it makes Owen uncomfortable for reasons he can't explain, that tickle of paranoia he has never been able to shake since his first day in the Hub. The fewer reasons they have to go to hospital, the better.

"You're meticulous, you're a fast learner, and you're good at following directions," Owen explains, stepping into the room and sitting on the edge of the table. "Plus, I outrank you. So you don't really have a say."

Which isn't entirely true. Tosh could probably pick up the basic techniques quick enough, and if Ianto were to say no, Owen would simply ask her. But with Jack gone, and everyone struggling to keep things running smoothly, it was a good time for Ianto to start doing more than just the dishes and the accounting.

Ianto reached across the table to pick up the last saucer, adding it to the stack in his hands. "All right," he says, and he squares his shoulders a bit despite the uncertain frown tugging on his features.

"Good," Owen says. "We'll start tomorrow."

That night Owen digs through his closet for the box of old textbooks shoved in the back and tries to figure out how to teach what he does practically in his sleep now and to someone with no medical training, but when he sits down with Ianto the next morning, he's surprised by how easily Ianto seems to grasp all the information thrown at him, and how much he already seems to know.

Ianto shrugs. "I pay attention."

"So you're trying to tell me that you've learned the difference between a horizontal mattress stitch and a running locked stitch just from watching me for a year?" And now that he thinks about it, he does remember Ianto hovering unnaturally close under the pretense of hand-holding whenever Owen had to stitch up one of the girls or watching unflinchingly as Owen cleaned and sewed up Ianto's wounds.

Ianto shrugs again and returns his attention to the pages he was reading, glancing at the diagrams. "Well, I'm not exactly clear as to which to use when, but...yes?"

"You need a hobby, mate," Owen tells him, clapping his hand on his shoulder as he gets up and heads down to the medical bay. He comes back with a suture kit and an orange, and well, fruit aren't really the best to practice on, but for their purposes, it'll do. He slices a line down the middle of the orange and sets in Ianto's coffee mug.

"I was drinking that," Ianto says.

"Well, you can't stitch it up if it's rolling all over the table, now can you?"

He shows Ianto a basic interrupted stitch and tries to remember to go slowly, to explain each step.

"Think you can manage that?" he asks, handing the forceps over.

"On a piece of fruit, maybe. On a person?"

"Don't worry about that right now. You may never have to, and if you do, it will probably be me. Are you trying to tell me you've never imagined sticking me with needles before?"

Ianto ratchets the forceps open and shut, getting a feel for them. "Not helping." He takes a deep breath and starts.

Owen lets him fumble through a couple on his own, just so he has a chance to get used to the angles, the amount of pressure, the rhythm of looping the nylon around the forceps.

"Why did you become a doctor?" Ianto asks without looking up from his work.

Owen considers giving him the standard line, but Ianto knows him well enough to see that he's not the _to help people_ type. Owen is in it for the science, for the mystery. People were always the worst part of the gig. Owen watches as Ianto pauses, shaking his hand out for a second.

"You're holding it too tight. You're hand is going to cramp. If you relax, it will be easier. The needle will do the work for you."

Ianto nods, takes a deep breath, and starts again. "Are you ignoring the question?"

"I became a doctor to prove my mother wrong."

Ianto glances up just for a second, but if he's surprised by the answer his face does not betray it.

"How so?" he asks.

Owen shrugs automatically, shifts in his chair, and it's been bloody _years_ since he left home, but the topic is still enough to make him squirm. He crosses his arms against his chest and juts out his chin, still in so many ways the defiant sixteen year old he was when he left. "She said I'd never amount to anything. And I thought, well, how many lives has _she_ saved?"

"I think you've saved the world a couple times over by now, Owen. I'd say you've won."

"You need to tie those to the side, not directly over the wound. Otherwise they're a right bastard to remove."

For a moment, Ianto concentrates on what he's doing, carefully tying each stitch, precise in his movements with steady hands. He finishes quickly and hands the orange to Owen for inspection. "Why did you leave then? Why come here?"

Owen frowns down at the fruit: not bad. Stitches a little uneven at the start, pulled a little too tight here and there, but mostly not bad. "Don't act like you haven't read my files. You know everything about this place. It's your job."

"I don't sit up at night reading the personnel files," Ianto says, sounding slightly scandalized by the idea. "Those are accessed only on an as needed basis. It's not my job to know everything about you lot. It's my job to know everything about everything else."

And it's strange to think about, really. That Ianto and everyone else for that matter know nothing of his life before he joined Torchwood, that he doesn't know anything about Toshiko who joined with Jack before him except that she was in prison and Jack got her out, that he only knows a handful of things about Gwen like her work with the police and that sodding boyfriend of hers, that Ianto was just some kid who kept bothering Jack, rubbing him the wrong way until someday, somehow he finally rubbed him the right way, and they'd been attached at the hip ever since. He can't decide if it's better not knowing, if it makes it easier somehow if every single thing in their lives is a secret, not just the scary monsters.

He's never talked about Katie, not once. He left his old life without ever looking back and started again and did his best to fuck and drink away the near constant ache in his chest. But now Ianto is watching him with eyebrows raised expectantly, his fingers fiddling absently with a piece of leftover nylon.

"Sorry. You don't have to say. I was just making conversation."

Owen looks down at the orange in his hand and starts speaking before he even realizes the words are there. "My fiancee had a brain tumor. She was twenty-three." And, god, it sounds so fucking young when he says it out loud. She hadn't even started her specialist training at the hospital yet. "When they went in to try to remove it, they found that it wasn't a tumor. It was an alien parasite, and it killed her. Killed everyone in the room. And who do you think just happened to show up right after to clean up the mess but Jack bloody Harkness. Right after. Because he knew, see. He knew exactly what was going to happen, and he could have fucking stopped it."

Ianto has stopped playing with the thread, his hands still, his brows knit together. "If he could have saved her, he would have. You know that."

But Owen shakes his head and sets his jaw because he can feel his throat growing tighter, and everyone told him it got easier with time, but it really fucking hasn't.

"He knew," Owen says again, his nails digging into the skin of the orange he still holds.

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Ianto reach out his hand, hesitate for a second before gently curling his fingers around Owen's wrist. "I'm sorry," he says quietly, his thumb brushing lightly over Owen's racing pulse. Owen shuts his eyes and breathes, waits for the burning in his eyes to subside, for the enraged pounding of his heart to quiet.

"Shall I have another go, then?" Ianto asks quietly after a moment when Owen finally lets out a breath that doesn't shake.


	7. drink

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _For a moment, Ianto just looks at him, at the bottle, and Owen shakes it a bit, tempting him. Ianto's fingers flex around the broom, and finally he turns to set the broom aside. "Just one."_

They stay late more often than not, and it's all part of this waiting game, this thinking Jack will return, and Owen knows that too much hope is a dangerous thing, that it's hard to survive the crash when it almost always comes. He sends the girls off, Gwen easy to convince with a reminder of Rhys waiting at home for her and Tosh suggestible and half-asleep when he wakes her with a gentle shake from where she's dozing at her desk. Ianto doesn't budge, though, and not for the first time, Owen wonders if he just stays some nights in the damp and the cold and the dark.

Owen pulls a bottle of scotch out of the back of a cabinet, grabs a couple of clean mugs, and finds Ianto cleaning out the cells.

"It's late," Owen tells him. "The girls have left."

Ianto doesn't look up. "Good."

"You should head out, too."

"I have work to do."

"I'm sure it can wait til tomorrow."

Ianto finally looks up, smooths down his tie, and notices the bottle and mugs Owen holds.

"At least take a break," Owen insists.

For a moment, Ianto just looks at him, at the bottle, and Owen shakes it a bit, tempting him. Ianto's fingers flex around the broom, and finally he turns to set the broom aside. "Just one."

***

It's never just one, these days. It hasn't been just one for a while now.

***

It's late. Later than before, and Owen is slumped back in Tosh's chair, his feet kicked up on her desk as he watches Ianto. He may be pissed, but he's not so far gone that he can't see a few drinks is having quite the opposite effect on Ianto than Owen had hoped. 

"He's not coming back, is he?" Ianto asks, voice dead and flat as he scans the information Saxon's cabinet sent over that morning, a dozen leads that they all know will amount to nothing, just like every dozen that's come before. Ianto shakes his head. "Someone like him? It must be so easy for him to just walk away and start a new life. We must seem so small to him. So insignificant. He'd always say, 'you people.' D'you ever notice that? As if we were so different to him that we could never even understand..."

Owen pulls himself carefully to his feet and sets a heavy hand on Ianto's shoulder. Ianto glances at it and lets out a shuddering breath before squeezing his eyes shut and muttering, "Sorry." 

"Ianto..." Owen starts, but that's as far as he gets. He's rubbish at this sober. Drunk, he's really absolute shit.

Which is possibly why Owen grabs Ianto's arm as he tries to walk away, spins him around, and kisses him, a bit too hard, teeth catching lips, but Ianto relaxes into it in a heartbeat, hands coming up to come hold Owen's face like he'd just been waiting for an invitation, just waiting to have someone to touch again. And yet, it's Ianto who pulls away abruptly, face still pinched as if pained, the tips of fingers still brushing through the hair at the back of Owen's neck.

"I don't even like you," Ianto breathes.

Owen huffs out a weak laugh. "And most days you're an irritating little shit." He grabs the lapels of Ianto's jacket and drags him down again, and it's just that drunken loneliness that twists in his stomach after too many drinks, that's been slowly eating away at him since Katie, that he can never quite silence no matter who he brings home. And he knows this will be no exception, but that's never stopped him.

Ianto is flushed with the whiskey, his tongue bitter, slow, and Owen presses him back against the console, surprised that Ianto lets him. Surprised that Ianto just gives in to him without a thought, and if that's the case...

He breaks away and says, "Come on." He runs a quick hand through his hair as he grabs his jacket.

"What?" Ianto isn't looking at him, isn't looking at anything really, just fixated on some point in space as he catches his breath.

"Back to mine."

"What?" Ianto says again, but Owen can tell by the deep furrow of Ianto's brow that he heard exactly what Owen said.

Owen shrugs and heads for the door without looking back. "If you're interested. If not feel free to stay here and cry about Jack fucking Harkness who left you behind without a second thought. Offer's on the table."

And it is. Just there for Ianto to take if he likes, and if not Owen will just go down the pub and find some girl he'll never talk to again, and it's really all the same to him. Except he thinks Ianto needs this and wouldn't ever ask for it, not even from nameless strangers in a bar. Or maybe they're both just drunk.

The cog door shuts behind him, and he makes his way to the car park with still no sign of Ianto following.

He fumbles with his keys once he reaches his car, squinting at them in the dark, trying to work out their fuzzy outlines.

"Owen." He jumps a the sound of Ianto's voice directly behind him and spins around.

"Give me the keys," Ianto insists, but his demand loses some of its weight when he's unable to hold Owen's gaze for long.

"No."

"Give me the keys. You're not driving like this."

He doesn't really care. Ianto is standing here, waiting to get into his car, and that means Owen has already won. And he's probably better off letting Ianto drive at this point, but still he closes his fist tighter around the keys, the ridges biting into his palm. "No," he says again. "I'm fine."

Ianto steps back and turns away, wiping a hand across his mouth and taking a deep breath. For a moment, Owen thinks he's going to turn and go without another word, and some small, distant part of him is a bit disappointed, but then he's being slammed back against the car door, Ianto's hands fisted in his shirt, and for a second they just stare each other down before Ianto releases him again.

"Forget it," Ianto says, stepping back. "Forget the whole thing. I don't need--"

"Then go," Owen says, with a lazy smirk and a shrug. He already knows that he won't.

Ianto takes a deep breath, fists by his sides, and Owen just waits, leaning back against the car, buzzing and warm with drink and whatever it is snapping back and forth between them, practically crackling in the air. And when Ianto finally looks at him again, still standing his ground, still not walking away, Owen simply tosses him the keys and walks round to climb into the passenger seat.

A moment later, Ianto climbs in beside him and slams the door shut. He stares straight ahead, wiping the palms of his hands on his trousers. "You're a prick," he says.

And Owen can't argue with that.

***

They bite and scrape on Owen's sheets. They twist and shove, rough and hurried and blurred, and they lick away each other's protests in those fleeting moments of sobriety that have them wondering what the fuck they're doing.

They need this. They don't need each other, but they need this.

***

Owen wakes to the sound of someone in his kitchen and squints wearily across the flat. It takes a moment for him to remember why Ianto would possibly be in his flat at half seven in the morning, searching through his cabinets.

"Why are you still here?" Owen groans.

"My car is at the Hub, and I don't have cash for a taxi." He shuts his eyes as if it pains him to say. "I need you to give me a ride in."

Owen sighs and scrubs his palm against his face hard enough to make the flesh hurt, but it does nothing to clear away the buzzing in his head. "Fine. Whatever."

Ianto gives a curt nod and starts searching the cabinets for sugar while Owen stumbles his way into the bathroom, pausing for a moment to examine the bite mark blooming purple and red at the base of his throat.

"Always the quiet ones," he mutters to himself.

At work, it is all a game of who can speak the fewest words, who can keep the most casual face, who can not let on. And yet Owen catches himself watching the way Ianto absently rubs his thumb against his lip as he stares at the computer screen. He waits it out. Waits to see what will happen when it's just the two of them again, if he'll get another bullet through him. But Ianto hides in the tourist office for most of the evening and finally Owen thinks, _Fuck it._

He pulls on his coat and heads up to the office. "Heading out for the night," he calls over his shoulder, pausing to turn his collar up before heading into the bay wind. "Right," Ianto responds, clearly making a point to not look away from his computer.

"Need a ride?" Owen asks, and he heads out the door without waiting for an answer. A moment later there is the unmistakable sound of the tourist office door slamming shut and Ianto's shoes crossing the dock, and Owen smirks.


End file.
